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Wednesday, April 19, 2006
Osmeña: Cebu’s energy crisis
By Antonio V. Osmeña
Estatements
Our political leaders and, more importantly, the inhabitants of Cebu need to determine which mix of alternative energy sources can provide power for the future. We must think and plan in three time frames that cover the 50-year period normally needed to develop new energy sources: the short term (2007-2017), the intermediate term (2017-2027) and the long term (2027-2062).
The first step is to decide how much of what types of primary energy, such as low-temperature heat, high-temperature heat, electricity and liquid fuels for transportation, are needed. We can then project the mix of alternative energy sources—as well as plan how to improve energy efficiency—that can provide the necessary services at the lowest lifetime cost and with acceptable environmental impacts.
This means that for each energy alternative, we need to know: (1) the total estimated supply available in each time frame, (2) estimated net useful energy yield, (3) projected costs of development and lifetime use and (4) potential environmental impacts.
Since the 1973 oil embargo, there have been major efforts to gather such information to help nations develop a long-term energy strategy. Projections about the future are always controversial.
Yet, despite difficulties in weighing and ascertaining the reliability of data, nations and individuals must try to evaluate the information available and use it to implement short-, intermediate- and long-term energy plans. These plans need to be updated and revised as new information becomes available.
In the area of electric energy, four alternative short-term options are available—coal, solar, oil and geothermal. Unfortunately, international energy companies are quite successful in lobbying for the use of coal and oil in our country.
Our indigenous geothermal energy and direct solar energy should now be a priority because of technological breakthrough.
The Philippines is one of the few countries in the world where geothermal energy escapes through hot springs, geysers and volcanoes.
Yet these resources end up, over thousands and millions of years, as nonrenewable deposits of dry, wet (a mixture of steam and water droplets) and hot water lying relatively close to the earth’s surface.
Geothermal wells can be drilled like oil and natural gas wells can be developed to bring this dry steam, wet steam or hot water to the earth’s surface.
According to estimates, undiscovered geothermal resources in our country contain about 10 times as much heat as those of already known reserves.
Renewable geothermal energy sources are also found in deposits of molten rock or dry hot rock zones where magma has penetrated the earth’s crust, raising the temperature of subsurface rock.
Energy can also be found in many areas in the country where there are low to moderate warm rock deposits that are useful in pre-heating water.
Using active or passive solar collectors to heat water is the simplest task. Depending on the yearly amount of sun available, solar water heaters can provide 30 to 100 percent of the hot water needs of a typical home, business, school or hospital. As energy prices rise, small rooftop solar collectors for heating water will be a common sight throughout the country.
Our country’s year-round direct input of solar energy can be directly converted by photovoltaic cells, commonly called solar cells, into electrical energy in one simple, nonpolluting step.
Advocates favor using solar cells primarily to produce electricity in large, centralized power plants and commercial installations. This approach is being pushed by solar cell manufacturers but will be discouraged by utilities, which would suffer financial loss if so many people begin producing their own power.
For Bisaya stories from Cebu. Click here. (April 19, 2006 issue)
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